Ellie's Bridal Boutique — Local services in Alexandria

I purchased a sample sale dress in September, which was sent to the dry cleaner prior to alteration. The dress came back with unusual wrinkles and marks, and the material seems to have changed significantly loosing its stiffness and crisp, which I inquired about but was reassured that that was normal and that they could be steamed out and pressed back to how it was, but they wanted to wait until alterations were done to do so because the seamstress working with the dress would wrinkle them again anyway. I trusted that advise and went ahead with and paid for alterations, after all they are in the business of selling wedding dresses and they should know. In the end, the wrinkles and marks could not be steamed/pressed out, buttons were falling off and the dress looks used. The manager and assistant manager said they would take it back to the dry cleaner to see if they might, I stress "might" (wouldn't you know?), have a commercial grade steamer that could fix the issues. I was assured that either one of them or even the owner would take the dress there personally and that they would do whatever they could to make this right and would call me as soon as the dress came back from the cleaner. That was November 3 and I have heard nothing back.. I have been calling to check on my dress and leaving messages but no one returned my calls so I have to come to the store today (Sat 12/5) to find that my dress is not there and is still at the cleaner. I was just told again that it would be back either Monday or Wednesday. I leave for my wedding overseas in a week (they know this) and that's only 3 days before I have to leave; more alterations still need to be done and I still don't know what condition my dress is in..

This is outrageously unacceptable!!!!!!! I trusted them, the professionals, to guide me through this process (which started so well with finding the perfect dress) but it is now ruined and nowhere to be found! It was THEIR RECOMMENDATION that the dress get cleaned before alterations because it's a sample and the fabric might shift after cleaning. It was THEIR RECOMMENDED CLEANER. It was THEIR GUARANTEE that they could steam and press the dress out to its original stage.. I loved the dress I found so much that even though it was out of my budget, I cut other costs so I could have my dream wedding dress.

I went to this boutique, not David's Bridal, not only because of the dress selection but because I want the level of professional and personal service that the business seems to have based on reviews, because I want to be able to trust someone completely with one of the most significant purchases of my life. That was NOT at all what I got.

I have to be fair that everyone has been nice to work with, especially my bridal assistant, (hence the 2 stars, not 1) but it does not change the fact that they have ruined my dress; the dress as it is now IS NOT AT ALL THE DRESS I PURCHASED!!!! This is NOT OK..

To give you some reference, the dress was over $4,000 (I was told) and marked down to about half during the Fall sample sale, dry cleaning was ~$190 which I paid for half and alteration as $500. It was a beautiful champagne real satin dress with delicate French lace appliques; so it seems to me that they are very inexperienced with this type of high-end material.

My yelp to you is that if you are thinking about finding your dress here, you have to BE VERY CAREFUL with what they tell you; they might turn up to be empty promises and guarantees as in my case. If you are willing to spend the type of money you would at this place for your dress and more importantly the experience of buying your wedding dress, there are better options out there in the DC area. This has been a very disappointing and stressful experience for me, on top of other stress of planning a wedding overseas, as you might imagine, no dress and a...

DO. NOT. GO. HERE. I beg you save your hard earned money for an establishment that is upfront, honest, and is going to provide you with the help and service you deserve. I bought my dress here, and I regret it. THIS IS NOT A GOOD BUSINESS. I get it, we are all human and mistakes happen, however when they do, a GOOD business tries to make it right.

The short story is that my dress was ruined by the dry cleaners they recommended. They did not catch that the dress was ruined and they tried to convince me that it wasn’t ruined that “it’s just what happens to silk fabric after being washed.”

This place is dishonest and shady. There are many other places you can find good deals. Don’t waste your time here.

My longer stories goes- went to their sample dress sale, found a great dress I love. They recommended I send it to a dry cleaner in NYC to get it cleaned, it cost more than the local place, but since my dress was silk it was safer to go with the super experts. I paid the money, they sent my dress and it was returned a month later. When I went in to pick up the dress I noticed some pretty vain-like bad wrinkles ALL over the dress is weird spotty areas. The dress was not like that prior. The owner was there and tried to convince me that "Sometimes after silk is washed it just is not the same".... well if I knew that washing the dress was going to ruin it I would have just worn a "dirty" dress, because it wasn't that dirty. I wouldn't have paid $125 to ruin my $2000 dress. The owner spent 30 minutes trying to convince me that 'silk is a very sensitive fabric'. OK, again, that's why we sent it to experts. So they sent it back to NYC to see what the company could do. I didn't hear anything for weeks, and only after me calling to get status updates was I given any information. The dry cleaning company saw that they had COMPLETELY RUINED the dress and agreed to get a replacement. I didn't know this until I called and was told that I would be getting a BRAND NEW DRESS, not a new sample, a brand new dress from the designer. I thought, well this is great, and it seems like everyone is being honest, upfront and making things 'right'. When I emailed a week later to get more information about when the dress would be in. They responded that they were sorry that I was given the wrong information, but that I would be receiving another sample. This is misrepresentation. Their sales associate had told me the wrong information, but never apologized for that mistake. I received a message a few days later stating that the new sample had arrived and I could come in to pick it up. I went in to pick up the dress and had the worst feeling appointment ever. I stayed calm the entire time, however every answer they gave was just more bullshit after bullshit after bullshit. Throughout the appointment I kept waiting for them to do or say something that in my head would have 'made this right', a good faith effort, but there wasn't anything. The owner was there the entire time and did not even knowledge me. If this was my business I would have been involved and attempting to make this situation better. If anything they were pushing me to leave sooner so they didn't have to deal with me. This was such a bad experience I can't say one nice or good thing about this place. I honestly BEG you to go elsewhere. A place that operates in this manner should not be in business. Which is a shame, because I really do love local business. My hope is that by posting this message the staff reads this and maybe decides to 'make things right' when...

Main point: My c(ali)onsultant was VERY unprofessional and the made the entire experience a nightmare.

I had a horrible time at this boutique. It was my first ever appointment so I didn’t really know what to expect. Even though my consultant was aware of that, I felt like I got little to no guidance on what to do.

This is what bothered me: After putting the dress on, by myself in the dressing room, I had to awkwardly open the door to see another customer and family shopping for their dress. There were moments where I didn’t know if my consultant was nearby so it felt so awkward waiting for anyone to come in with a dress half on. Once my consultant came in, for every single dress, she took the sides and yanked them HARD to get the dress closed. There was no warning, no apologizes. It made me feel like an inconvenience. For the last 2 dresses, my consultant asked me to put on the heels in the dressing room. I told her I brought my own and if it was okay to wear mine. She responded by telling me how the shoes in the dressing room were preferable and said something about the strap in the front? I don’t know what she said because it was confusing. She asked if that made sense, which I said no, and when I asked, for the second time, to wear my shoes, she said yes and looked very annoyed.

Once my consultant walked me to the block and had me step on, she walked away either to the front desk or somewhere else in the boutique. She didn’t help me fix the dress, she didn’t ask how I felt in the dress, what i liked or disliked, nothing. It ended up being my friend asking all those questions. and once we were done with the dress, there was another awkward period where I’m just standing there waiting with my consultant nowhere around. I brought 3 people with me for my appointment and 2 of them were running late. Once everyone was present, my consultant didn’t leave the area, fixed my dress, asked me all the questions.

I felt like my consultant didn’t get a good idea of what I was looking for. I specifically asked to see thing straps and off the shoulder dresses and i only got straps.

Prior to the appointment, there was a google survey that needed to be complete. I specifically requested for the price to NOT be brought up in front of everyone. My consultant did the complete opposite and spoke about pricing with the whole group. She was also pushing for me to buy a certain dress and would bring up the adjusted price of the dress (I think it was off the rack?) often.

The area where the dresses were felt really tight and packed so it made looking at dresses difficult. My friend was trying to adjust the hangers to get a better look at a dress when my consultant very rudely told her not to pick up any dresses and to leave it on the rack. I get it, the dresses are heavy and because of how long they are it could be very easy for someone to fall and hurt themselves. But I truly believe there is a nicer, more professional way of communicating that (“Oh let me get that for you! Do you need help seeing...